


About Time

by elusivelover_archivist



Category: Star Wars Original Trilogy
Genre: Friends to Lovers, Friendship/Love, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-11
Updated: 2018-12-11
Packaged: 2019-09-16 12:34:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,818
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16954119
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/elusivelover_archivist/pseuds/elusivelover_archivist
Summary: By Vic CoopersSpring comes to a desolate world.





	About Time

**Author's Note:**

> Note from Cara Loup, the archivist: this story was originally archived at [Elusive Lover](https://fanlore.org/wiki/Elusive_Lover_\(Star_Wars_archive\)) and was moved to the AO3 as part of the Open Doors project in 2018. I tried to reach out to all creators about the move and posted announcements, but may not have reached everyone. If you are the creator and would like to claim this work, please contact me using the e-mail address on [Elusive Lover’s collection profile](https://archiveofourown.org/collections/ElusiveLover).

“I’ll take the messages to Luke and Chewbacca,” Kalia offered. “I have to go out that way anyway.”

From under a console, Aunt Efra replied something that might have been, “Thanks, sweetie.” The connector block Efra was about to use was — as usual — between her teeth, not tidily in her tool basket and Kalia might have misheard the ‘sweetie’. So she let it go.

This time.

Efra took the connector out of her mouth, wiped it on her sleeve and put it in place. After fiddling with some wires for a few minutes, she slid out far enough to look up at her assistant. “Check that circuit, will you, Oren?”

Oren waved a hand in front of a screen, then stabbed at some controls. Nothing happened.

“Damn,” Efra muttered, disappearing back under the console.

Sighing, Oren collected some holo-plaques that had popped out of a slot beside the screen. “At least the plaque-writer’s working today. Here you are, Kalia. Official message for Luke Skywalker from the Reparation Committee and a personal one from Senator Organa. Copy of the formal notification from Kashyyyk about the clan chiefs’ travel plans for Chewbacca, and a message for each of them from Chewbacca’s partner.”

“The Wookiee clan chiefs are coming here soon, then?” Kalia asked. She refrained from jumping up and down — she was a little old for such childish displays of excitement.

“Yes. And they’re coming in Chewbacca and his partner’s ship as we requested, so we don’t have to worry about any official New Republic hoo-ha.”

“Oh, Kalia—” Aunt Efra emerged again from under the console, this time removing a plasma solder gun from her mouth. “Ask Luke what the Repar Committee said to him. I want to be very sure of their agenda before they get here.”

“I will ask, but why should he tell me?”

Efra and Oren exchanged smiles. “He likes you,” Efra said.

Kalia was secretly rather pleased about that. “That’s because I have sensible conversations with him, instead of trying to chat him up like Lisha and her friends.”

Efra seemed to be trying not to laugh. She slid back under the console, the solder gun back in her mouth, muttering, “Just you wait a couple of years, young lady.”

Kalia didn’t get a chance to say anything to that. Oren had exclaimed, “Oh! That reminds me. I’ve got something for your sister.” He handed her another stack of plaques. “These are the next episode of that interminable serial her friend on Corellia keeps sending her.” Oren put on a stern expression. “Tell Lisha it had better be good — it took our entire operational sat-link bandwidth to download it. Fortunately none of the messages that were delayed seem to have been urgent. Next time, she should get her friend to a send a low-res version or use more efficient compression.” His serious look wavered and he grinned. “And then tell her that I want to borrow it as soon as she’s finished with it. I can’t imagine how they’re going to get out of that last cliff-hanger.”

Kalia had no idea why her older sister found the holos so engrossing. They were dramatizations of a famous — and extremely long — Corellian saga. Lisha and her friends stoutly maintained that looking forward to the next episode was all that had kept them going through the interminable winter. Kalia’s mother had shrugged and said, as she often did, “Don’t knock what works.” Lisha was always reminding people that she was four years more grown up than Kalia, so Kalia was quietly proud that she’d spent the long, dark nights more productively, reading the first twenty volumes of the Encyclopedia Galactica, even though she’d paid most attention to the entries on animals and plants and skipped many of the art and literature articles.

Oren was adding a final plaque to her pile. “And here’s a summary of the latest news from the Core Worlds.”

Kalia stowed the plaques safely in a pocket of her work-vest. It was easier to handle them as a pile than individually — her fingers were sometimes still clumsy when handling thin, light objects. She swung open the heavy security door, stepped out of the Comms Center into the main corridor and blinked. As was usual now, the bunker’s massive blast doors were wide open. What was not so usual was the bright sunlight streaming in through them.

Kalia bent down and scooped up a handful of the still ubiquitous dust and ash. She blew it into a sunbeam to see the motes dance in the light. Sunlight... Today was the fifth day straight of sunshine.

Once outside, she looked up. There were still clouds, but today they were white and scattered, high up in the sky, totally different from the suffocating grey blanket that had covered all Diemia for so many months. The sky was blue again. Before the clouds had covered it, it had been dark with smoke and dust. Shutting her eyes against the brightness, she raised her face and held out her arms. There wasn’t sufficient heat to register on her hands, but she could feel the sun’s warmth on her face.

 _Thank you, Goddess. The Cycle isn’t broken, after all. Spring has come_. She lowered her hands, looked at the skeletal trees around the bunker and couldn’t help adding, _About time_.

 

On the way to the greenhouses, Kalia triggered the audio on the news plaque. She would rather have listened to the birds singing, but she should keep up with events. Her elders’ big mistake had been in assuming that their disinterest in the Empire was mutual and the Imperials would have no use for this agricultural world. But most of the news was dull. It was much more interesting that on fruit trees she’d thought dead, a few buds had appeared. The only vaguely noteworthy news item was the announcement of the engagement of the Senator Organa who sent so many messages to Luke.

It was odd not to see the greenhouses glowing. In the past few days they’d finally been able to turn off the artificial lighting.

“Lovely day,” called old Kinlan, who was pulling up tubers.

*And many more to come,* bellowed a Wookiee who was balancing on the roof frame, silhouetted against the sky — the clear, blue sky. He was rolling up a wall to let in the fresh air and sunshine. A few of the greenhouses were made of proper transparisteel, but this one, like most, was clear polymer sheet draped over whatever framework had been scrounged from the rubble.

“Your mother’s calculations were correct,” another voice added, much more quietly. That was Marik. He’d been the commander of the Imperial work camp before he’d got into trouble for looking after his prisoners. His superiors had called it fraternizing, or some word like that. They’d been prepared to overlook for a while his lenient treatment of the Diemians, but Marik had treated the Wookiees that had been brought in as slave labor just as well. That, it seemed, had been completely unacceptable. In the end they’d court-martialled him and put him and his family to work, too. Things had got a lot worse for everyone after Marik had been replaced.

He seemed to Kalia to be much happier as a vegetable gardener than he had been as Camp Commandant. He brushed at his greying hair, apparently not noticing the mud he smeared on his face in the process, and smiled at her. “I knew Rakia was a better climatologist than any of those so-called experts brought in from Sullust.”

“So did I,” Kalia said proudly. She didn’t mention how afraid her mother had been that this time her climate models might be wrong. There had been no summer this year in the northern hemisphere, and their autumn so far had been harsher than any winter for generations.

But here in the south — Kalia looked around. The branch-tips of the conifers that had struggled for so many months were yellow-green with new growth. Yes, here it did, at last, seem to be spring.

Kalia’s personal seed-trays were in the back corner of the greenhouse. The more mundane plants like beans and salad greens had been growing most of the winter, not fussy whether light and warmth came from the sun or from lamps and heater coils. But the other seeds she’d planted were more choosy. Silverbeams were notoriously difficult to cultivate off Kashyyyk. If the seeds didn’t sprout soon, they’d rot and she didn’t have any more. She could ask for more from off-world, but it wouldn’t be the same. These were ones she wanted — needed — to grow.

She pushed away the green leaves and tendrils of the beans. She’d thought she’d seen a tiny flash of brighter color —

She had. There were two of them, two small seedlings, their stems more palest green than silver, but each with a characteristic pair of tiny purple fronds. They had finally sprouted. She rocked back on her heels and beamed at them. “About time.”

 

Luke Skywalker, Chewbacca and their droid, Artoo, were helping with one of the multi-purpose tractors. There had been no point in plowing or sowing for months and spare parts had been scarce. As a result most of the surviving tractors had had components cannibalized to keep other equipment running. Now parts were in turn being scrounged from the massive Imperial factory units to get the tractors going again.

“Hullo!” Kalia called, over the hum of the tractor’s power cell. “I’ve got some messages for you.”

“Hi, Kalia!” Luke’s smile was a flash of white against his grimy face.

*Good day,* Chewie rumbled from inside the tractor’s cab. *Just give us a few minutes to see if this works.*

“Okay.” Kalia backed to a distance where she’d be safe, whichever of the tractor’s implements might move. While she waited she took a quick glance at her sister’s holo. As usual, the title sequence featured two young men in very ripped clothing, one blond, one dark, armed with swords and knives. The saga purported to be the true story of the heirs to two feuding clans, sometime in Corellia’s dim and distant past. Kalia had to admit that the blond one was cute, although she doubted his waist-long mane of fair hair would stay so pristine through all those pitched battles. And the stories were so predictable. Last episode, the heroes had been trying to kill each other with their bare hands, which meant that by three minutes into this one, they’d have stopped fighting and started kissing. Kalia had no idea why Lisha and her friends found all that mushy stuff so fascinating. She shrugged, stuffed the plaque back in her pocket and turned her attention back to Luke and Chewie. Fixing tractors was much more interesting.

What was also interesting was that Luke’s right hand was just as dexterous as his left and, although he’d rolled up the sleeves of his padded shirt, she couldn’t see the join between the artificial hand and his arm. She looked down at her own hands. They worked okay most of the time and she was very lucky to have them, even if they looked like she was permanently wearing gloves.

When Luke’s visit had been announced, Kalia’s mother, Aunt Efra and the others had tried to learn as much as they could about him. It had been easier with Chewbacca, because some of the surviving Wookiees knew of him. A search of the news archives had found only a few images of Luke, in which he’d been with groups of officials, usually in the background, always dressed in black, always looking so grave and serious. Kalia had never seen him in the black uniform in real life — he wore work clothes like everybody else. The trousers and padded shirt he had on today might once have been blue, but they were so old and covered in oil stains it was difficult to tell. Compared with Deimian humans, he had very fair skin. At first, Kalia had been unsure she could like anyone so pale; the only other fair-skinned humans she’d seen were Imperials. But then Marik and Kinlan were pale too, only she didn’t often notice anymore.

“Okay, Artoo,” Luke was yelling. “Tell the tractor to try lowering the seed drills again.”

For a moment, nothing happened. Then there was a brief scraping sound and the drills moved, first down, then up again and then lowered themselves into their working position.

Chewie emerged from the cab. *Looks like we fixed it.*

“We did?” Luke jumped down from the rear of the tractor.

“Do you have to sound so surprised about that?” Kalia asked, although they looked more pleased with themselves. Kalia wasn’t surprised that they’d got the tractor working — Chewbacca and Luke were almost as good at fixing things as Aunt Efra.

She studied Luke as he found a rag and wiped his hands on it. “There’s something different about you.”

*He’s dirtier than usual?* Chewbacca offered, grabbing the rag and making as if to rub an oil smudge from Luke’s face.

“No... I think it’s your hair.”

*It needs cut even more than usual?* Chewie suggested.

No, although Luke’s hair was longer and much less tidy than it had been in the holos. He looked nicer like this. “It’s not quite the same color,” Kalia decided. When she’d first met Luke she’d felt a little sorry for him, for having such boring light brown hair. Kalia’s own hair wasn’t long like her sister’s, but it was a beautiful glossy blue-black.

Chewie was making a great show of examining Luke’s hair while Luke pretended to fight him off. *Kalia’s right. It is getting lighter again.*

“Why?”

Luke gave Chewie a final push away and smiled her. “It’s the UV in the sunlight. It bleaches fair hair.”

Kalia filed that fact away and got out the holo-plaques, carefully separating Lisha’s from Chewie and Luke’s.

Chewie indicated her news plaque. *Anything interesting happening?*

“No, not really.” Kalia held her arms up again to the sun. “Not nearly as interesting as it being spring...” She remembered that what seemed trivial to her might seem important to Luke and Chewie. “Oh, your friend got engaged. The Senator Organa that sends Luke so many messages.”

Kalia had expected that news to please them, but their only reaction was dead silence. Finally, Chewie said, *Did the announcement say to whom she got engaged?*

“Yes...” Kalia began. Luke was standing very still. He looked... as if he felt the way Kalia had all winter, as if he were waiting for something much desired that he feared wasn’t going to happen. Had he wanted to marry this Senator Organa? Maybe that was what all the messages they sent each other had been about. Maybe Kalia should let him view the news-plaque himself... But Chewie was looking impatient, so she plunged on. “I don’t remember his name, but they said he was another Alderaani. One who’d been in space and escaped the Alderaan system when the planet was destroyed.”

Chewie gave a loud whoop. Unsure whether it was of approval or outrage, Kalia backed off, but then Chewie was smiling, almost dancing. He grabbed Luke and hugged him. *Told you it would all work out.*

Luke patted Chewie’s arm. He was smiling too, a smile like the first time the sun had come out from the months-long clouds. He sat down on a tool box and was silent for a moment, staring down at the ground as if he needed to collect himself. He looked back at Kalia. “There’s an Alderaani survivor called Jatru that Leia’s been telling me a lot about. They’d been friends since childhood. But he was a follower of the Alderaani pacifist religion which teaches that violence never solves anything, only begets more violence, and he wasn’t prepared to fight the Empire. In one of her less diplomatic moments, Leia called him a coward. He spent the rest of the war on New Alderaan with the others who felt that the way to morally defeat the Empire was to rebuild their society. It was only once the war ended that he and Leia started speaking to each other again and found they still had things in common.”

“That must be what this message is about.” Kalia handed Luke the holo-plaque. “Um... she probably thought you’d get it before the official announcement. We’ve still only got a few comms satellites working reliably, and there was a delay in downloading this morning.”

Chewie was looking at her with what seemed to be a mixture of amusement and curiosity. *We know about the problems you’ve been having with the comms-net repairs. And you know that we know. So why are you blushing?*

*I am not blushing.* Kalia put her hands to her face, but the artificial nerves weren’t sensitive enough to tell if it was warm. She sighed and decided she’d better explain. “The delay was sort of my sister’s Lisha’s fault. Her friend on Corellia sent her this really long holo-drama. Apparently she’s said that this episode was really good, so Lisha asked her to send it with better resolution.” She offered the plaque to Chewie.

He triggered the holo and let out a hoot of laughter. *Not the Border Feud Saga. I haven’t seen that in years.* Cocking his head to one side he added, *It is a very clear image.*

“The Border Feud?” Luke stood up to get a better view of the holo. “Leia said she watched some of that. Someone told her it had some interesting insights into the Corellian psyche.”

*What did she think of it?*

“She said that she liked the costumes and the scenery and the music but she got fed up with the two main characters taking so long to figure out they were in love with each other.”

That produced another hoot from Chewie. Why the Wookiee should find that so funny, Kalia had no idea, but he was clutching his middle, laughing so hard he could barely stand and nearly dropping the holo plaque. Eventually, he took a big breath, turned the holo off, gave it back to Kalia and looked at his own plaques. *I’d better see what Han has to tell me.*

Kalia turned what she hoped was her most winsome smile on him and Luke. “Later, would you have time to come to the greenhouses with me? There’s something I want to show you, but I have to feed the lampacas and the poultry first.” _And I must remember to ask about the message from the Reparations Committee_.

“Sure, after we finish with the tractors.”

Heading back towards the lampaca pens, Kalia couldn’t resist looking round to see Luke and Chewie playing their messages. She couldn’t see the holos clearly at this distance and angle, but she did catch some of the words.

“Luke,” Senator Organa was saying, “I want you to know that I’m not doing this for Alderaan. It’s what I want. It just isn’t going to work out with Han. The life I’m going to live isn’t going to suit him, and there’s so much to do. Jatru will give me the support I need to accomplish what has to be done. I don’t think Han would be able to do that...”

 

It was late afternoon before Kalia got back to the greenhouses. The lampacas had been much livelier than usual. Even the older cows, the ones who’d had a dozen calves each, were kicking up their heels. The herds were much smaller now than before the war, but they’d still, against all Diemia’s principles of self-sufficiency, had to import grain for them from off-world. The beasts ate it, but it was nerf fodder and nerf digestive systems were different from lampacas’. They’d lived, but they hadn’t thrived. Hopefully they’d be better soon. The withies were showing green shoots. If this glorious sunshine really was spring, the lampacas should have some familiar food soon.

Luke and Chewie were at the greenhouse before her. Chewie was helping roll the sides of the greenhouse back down and Luke was working with Marik on the irrigation system.

“How’d an X-wing pilot come to know so much about plumbing?” Marik was asking.

“I was raised on a Tatooine moisture farm.” Luke smiled. “Old habits die hard. I still can’t see a leak without doing something to fix it, even where there’s plenty of water.”

Kalia waved at them and went to the back of the greenhouse to check whether her seedlings had survived the day’s exposure to the elements.

They had. On the larger, a third leaf was just beginning to uncurl.

Chewie came across the roof by swinging from rafter to rafter. He dropped down, landing surprisingly lightly for someone so big and solid. Kalia was used to Wookiees being underfed and skinny. Marik’s successor had reckoned that both Wookiees and humans worked better when hungry; no amount of evidence that all either did was die quicker had changed his mind.

Kalia held the seed tray up to Chewie. “Look.”

He took the tray in one big hand as Luke came up beside him. With a finger, he very gently touched the tiny leaves. *Silverbeams,* Chewie announced. *How did you get them to sprout? They’re not easy to grow off Kashyyyk. Naturally they propagate only after the berries are eaten by ketsal birds.*

“I know,” Kalia said. She sighed. “And I had no idea what ketsal birds looks like, let alone what sort of stomach acids they have. I tried soaking some of the seeds in water, and some hot vinegar and some I put in the poultry feed and then collected all the manure. I don’t know which ones finally sprouted. I put the beans around them because I read that they need lots of nitrogen.” It had also said that silverbeams needed lots of potassium, but that wasn’t a problem. A good source of potassium was wood ash and there was plenty of ash on Diemia.

Chewie hunkered down beside her and carefully replaced the seed tray in its slot. *You didn’t need to go to all that effort. My people are bringing seedlings from Kashyyyk.*

Lots of seedlings. One for every Wookiee who’d died on Diemia. Kalia’s people had been growing trees, too. Natives for the Diemians, seeds from other planets for the off-worlders. For all the off-worlders — they’d salvaged the Imperial records and found the homeworlds of both the other prisoners and the garrison.

So many times during the past few months it had seemed pointless. Even if the seeds sprouted, they might never grow outside and there were no materials to build greenhouses big enough for them all. But now they would be able to perform the ritual that Diemians and Wookiees had in common and plant the trees over the graves of the dead. And in the places where graves would have been, if there had been anything left to bury.

Kalia made sure the seed tray was sitting properly to get the right amount of water when the sprinklers were switched on. “It was important to me that I grew these seeds.”

Over the top of her head, Luke and Chewie looked at each other. They sat down, one on either side of her. “Why?” Luke asked, very quietly.

“For my friend Cachbacca. She was out picking silverbeam berries when the Imperials captured her and her family. She had a bunch in her hand and somehow she held onto it. Later she made a bracelet of them—” Kalia patted Chewie’s arm. “She was shaggier than you, so she could hide it in her fur. It was good she was so furry — she kept me warm at nights.” Kalia snuggled closer to Chewie. He was warm, too.

She went on, “After Marik was replaced and it wasn’t safe for the Wookiees to keep anything, Cachbacca gave the bracelet to me. I promised that when we were both free, we’d plant the seeds together.” _And she is free now. Her spirit is, anyway_.

“What happened to her?” Luke asked in that same quiet voice.

“She died when the camp was destroyed. That’s how I hurt my hands, trying to get her out of the rubble. I never noticed how hot it was and how many sharp pieces there were. I dug and dug and dug, but she was already dead when I got to her.”

“I’m sorry,” Luke said. That was all there ever was to say, but she could feel that he meant it.

She looked up at him. “Can you do some Jedi thing to make sure the trees will grow?”

“I can try.” He gave a quick smile. “I don’t know if it will work, though. The poultry manure and the bean mulch might be a safer bet.” But he knelt up and pulled the tray out again. He put his hands round the seedlings and shut his eyes. Kalia wasn’t sure if she’d expected anything to happen. If anything had, it wasn’t obvious.

She looked at him as he put the tray back and brushed soil off his hands onto his trousers. “Luke, why have you stayed here? Originally they said you’d only be here for a couple of days. Do you have to stay until the Reparation Committee gets here?”

He sat down again. “No, I don’t have to stay. But I wanted to. I like it here. And if I’m here when the Committee arrives, I can make sure that they listen to your people.”

“That’s good. People here are worried about the Committee. My aunt thinks they might help us rebuild only if we change over to intensive mechanized farming like the Empire wanted. Or do awful things like executing Marik, or old Kinlan. Kinlan didn’t do anything bad — he was just the camp cook, and he fiddled his records so he could feed us more. None of us want to execute Marik either. He did his best for us, and all his family died in the camp.”

Luke was shaking his head. “They won’t do anything like that. At worst, you might have put up with some lectures on best farming practice from people who’ve never been in a field in their lives. Some Core Worlders get a little carried away with their pet theories about what’s best for less industrialized worlds.”

“If they don’t know anything about farming, why do they have to come at all?”

“The New Republic believes that Diemia is due reparation because it was an Alliance officer who had the idea of using an asteroid to take out the Imperial space station that was in orbit. Her ship didn’t have any weapons capable of disabling the station and she didn’t know it was just a supply depot to store produce before the Imperials shipped it out of your system. She thought it was a battlestation, with armaments like those that destroyed Alderaan.”

Kalia thought about that. “If the station had had powerful weapons, it could have vaporized the asteroid completely, instead of breaking it up.”

“Maybe. And then there would have been no dust in your atmosphere, no fragments would have struck Diemia, and there would have been no ash and smoke from the forest fires.”

“And no year-long winter,” Kalia finished. “Good intentions don’t always turn out right, do they?”

Luke was rubbing at his right wrist. “No, they don’t.” He looked round and smiled at her. “The Reparations Committee will bring medical supplies and personnel. There aren’t any conditions on medical aid, so your people will be free to disagree with any or all of the Committee’s recommendations.” Luke stretched out the fingers of his right hand. “You’ll get hands as good as mine.”

Kalia held both of his hands for a moment, but of course hers couldn’t feel any difference in them. She ran the underside of her wrist over first one and then the other. They both felt warm. “I’m glad you like it here.”

“There’s a lot of people have a lot of ideas about what I should do with my life.” He gave another quick smile, this one rueful. “Whatever I do isn’t going to please a lot of them... So another reason I’ve stayed is that here I could do things that I felt were worthwhile, and that my aunt and uncle, who brought me up, would have thought were worthwhile.”

Kalia could tell that his aunt and uncle must be dead. She was about to take her turn to say, “I’m sorry,” but Chewie’s long arm had reached behind her to poke Luke in the ribs. *Doing something worthwhile while you were waiting.*

“I am not,” Luke announced, “waiting.” He looked up at Chewie with what Kalia decided was an attempt at a grave and portentous expression. “I am trusting in the Force and in my own instincts, and being patient.” He shook his head, ran his hands through his hair and smiled. A proper smile this time. “Patience, so I’ve repeatedly been told, is a virtue, but I was just about out of it.”

“I know what that’s like,” Kalia said. “I don’t think I could have waited any longer for spring.” She wondered if it was worth asking what Luke had been waiting for but decided against it. If he thought she should know he’d tell her. Instead she said, “You told Marik that you’re from Tatooine. I thought Tatooine was all desert. How can you have a farm in a desert?”

Luke smiled again. “With great difficulty.”

 

By the day the Wookiees arrived, even the most pessimistic had admitted that it really was spring, not some temporary chance improvement in the weather. It was getting hard to see where the camp walls had been; the cracked petricrete was disappearing under a mass of vineweed. Trees and grasses were coming up everywhere. Lots of plants on Diemia needed fire to propagate, but the experts from Sullust had said that the infernos that had blazed around the planet had been too intense for any seeds to survive.

“Doesn’t surprise me,” Aunt Afra had announced proudly. “I knew our seeds are tougher than the Core Worlders credited them to be.”

“Like our people,” Rakia had added, more quietly but with no less pride.

Five more of Kalia’s silverbeam seeds had survived and sprouted, too. Luke said that was due more to the care she’d taken with them than anything he’d done, but Kalia wasn’t so sure. She gave the extra seedlings to Cachbacca’s clan, to take back to Kashyyyk and plant there. One day she’d go and see how well they grew.

She’d waited until the formal ceremonies were over before she went to plant the two silverbeams. The horizon was all reds and pinks and oranges; her mother had said that the dust and ash still in the atmosphere would produce spectacular sunsets for months. She got Chewie to come with her. No matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t pronounce the things she wanted to say in Wookiee. Cachbacca would have understood them in Standard, but Kalia felt it important to say them in her friend’s own language. So after they’d patted the soil in place around the little trees and watered them, Kalia had spoken in Standard and Chewie had repeated what she said in High Kashyyyk.

Chewie was a lot bigger than Cachbacca had been, but his shoulder was also very comfortable to cry on.

After a while, he said, *Two trees are good. Silverbeams don’t grow as well on their own.* He smoothed Kalia’s hair. *One for your friend and one for your childhood, that the war also took away.*

Kalia hadn’t thought of it like that — she just hadn’t wanted Cachbacca’s tree to be lonely. She wiped her face on her sleeve and gave the ground another pat. There wasn’t just the other silverbeam to keep it company. Other shoots were pushing up through the ash, too tiny yet for Kalia to tell what they were.

She looked up, surprised at how dark it was. It was good to see the stars again. She heard footsteps approaching and straightened her tunic. “Who—” she began, but Chewie put his paw to his mouth and indicated that she should be quiet. Then he pantomimed moving on tiptoe. Kalia nodded, wondering what he was up to.

Chewie didn’t literally tip-toe, but he did move almost silently up to a clump of withies. Even a week ago, Kalia would have been able to see over them — now she had to look between their branches. She snuck up beside Chewie, feeling pleasantly conspiratorial.

Luke was standing in a little grove in the midst of the trees. There was another, taller man coming through the trees towards him. Kalia squinted through the twilight and recognized Chewie’s partner.

Luke said, “Han.”

The taller man said, “Kid.” Kalia would have been insulted if he’d called her that, but Luke didn’t seem to mind. He smiled.

There was a brief moment when neither of them seemed to know what to do. Then they hugged each other. When Han had first emerged from his ship, he’d hugged both Chewie and Luke, but this time he didn’t let go.

After a while, Han began, “Listen, kid—” but when Luke looked up at him, he didn’t say anything more, just stared into his eyes.

After another while, he ruffled Luke’s hair. “You’ve been out in the sun.”

“Yes.”

“Good. Wouldn’t like you get vitamin D deficiency.” That had sounded very like Aunt Efra, but when Han carried on, it was with much less assurance. “Kid, the past few months, I’ve...” He shrugged. “I’ve been—” He took a big breath. “I think it took me longer than I wanted to admit to myself to get over the carbon freeze.”

Again, Luke just said, “Yes.”

“It’s been weird. Sometimes I’ve felt like I came out of hibernation into a parallel universe, or I’d lost some of my memories. So often the way Leia remembered things wasn’t what I thought had happened. But I do remember that night in the survival tent and—”

“And—”

“And I meant what I said, Luke. I still mean it.”

“So do I.”

For another long moment they did nothing but continue looking at each other. And then Han tilted his head down and Luke reached up, and they kissed, almost carefully, or experimentally. Maybe they’d never done so before. If it had been Lisha’s holo-drama, there would have been romantic music welling up in the background. Instead there was just the wind rustling in the withies and some pond-frogs croaking.

Luke said, “Ohhh...”

Han said, “Oh, yeah...”

There was nothing tentative about their second kiss. It wasn’t anything like Lisha’s mushy holos, though. Somehow, they just looked right together.

Beside Kalia, Chewie gave a quiet, approving grunt. *About time.*

* * * * *


End file.
